A record number of passengers made in cross-boundary trips between HKIA and eight SkyPier ferry destinations in Macao and the Pearl River Delta (PRD), growing 5.3% year on year to 2.8 million.

Four new carriers began operating in Hong Kong during the year, including American Airlines, Siam Air, Vanilla Air and Jetstar Japan.

Meanwhile, seven scheduled destinations for passenger and freight services, including Calgary, Changzhou, Kagoshima, Udon Thani, Washington, Xishuangbanna and Yiwu – were added to HKIA’s network. As at the end of March 2015, HKIA had over 100 airlines serving approximately 180 destinations.

Fred Lam, chief executive officer of the AA said, “We are delighted to see record-breaking traffic. HKIA is currently operating at over 90% of its capacity, and we expect that it will reach saturation in the near future. Because of this, we must continue developing the airport in order to maintain its competitiveness.”

Simon Willmore is the editorial director of Travel Daily and a board member of the British Guild of Travel Writers. His writing has covered everything from blogging for National Geographic Traveller to a tech column for a women's magazine to coauthoring five guide books with Rough Guides and Frommer's.